Boy Falls to Death in Glacier National Park at Same Location as Fatality Last Year

Glacier National Park officials are reporting that boy has died after a tragic fall that occurred near the Going-to-the-Sun Road.

"A teenage boy was exploring the area where the area where the culvert that Haystack Creek flows through goes under the Going-to-the-Sun Road," said Park Spokesperson Lauren Alley explains. He reportedly slipped and fell and was carried over... it's a drop of about 100 feet. Park Rangers recovered the victim on a litter-carryout yesterday [July 31]."

The boy has been identified as 15-year-old Spencer Flerchinger of Kamiah, Idaho. In an eerie coincidence, during the same week last year [July 26, 2017], 26-year-old Robert Durban from the Bitterroot Valley slipped and fell to his death in almost the exact same spot.

"This is pretty unusual, given that we just saw a fatality there last year," Alley said. "The individual who died there last year was reportedly taking photographs there above the culvert. One of the things that we are really urging people to do is to really give extra thought when they go out onto public lands about the hazards that can exist. You see people playing in the creeks, there are a lot of people that do things like this every single day in the park and its very easy to think 'oh, that could never happen to me, that could never happen to my family.'"

After two fatalities in the same spot, Alley says officials are looking into how public use in the area around Haystack Creek has changed. When asked if there were warnings posted near the culvert, Alley said that there are about 42 waterfalls in the park and they work to get the safety message out through park rangers, the local newspaper and other sources.